Archive for the ‘Charts’ Category

Chores can help teach your kids responsibility and help them grow up to be conscientious and dependable adults. By creating a job chart, a chore chart, or I’ve even heard them called a responsibility chart, children will know what they are responsible for, and be able to help out around the house in a more orderly fashion. That means less stress on parents and kids.

Here are some tips on creating a chore chart that everyone can live with and maybe even love.

1. Identify what chores need to be done. Make a list and be sure to ask the kids and your spouse what chores they think are important. Involving them as much as possible gives them a sense of ownership and it can improve their willingness and enthusiasm for finishing their jobs.

2. Ask each child what chores they would like to do. Of course it’s not a perfect world and you probably aren’t going to be able to hand out chores to each child that they love, but if they would prefer to take out the recycle instead of the trash, we can always try to be accommodating. Remember to assign age appropriate chores.

3. Decide how often the chores need to be done. A bed has to be made everyday but the living room may only need to be dusted every other week.

4. Give each chore a deadline of when it needs to be completed by. Some ideas for deadlines may be before leaving for school, before dinner, or before playing with friends.

5. Assign a reward for each chore. Rewards may include money, items, privileges, or any other benefit you can think of.

6. Log into MyJobChart.com and use what you came up with above to set up your child’s online chore chart. You’ve already done the hard part, figuring out the chores, deadlines and rewards. Entering it online is the easy part.

7. Here’s an idea. Set an example by including yourself on the job chart and doing your chores alongside your children.

It may be easier to just do the chores yourself, but think about the long term benefits and the lessons you are teaching your children by including them in the household chores. By making chores a family ordeal and giving your kids a voice in the process, it may not solve all your problems but it should certainly help with the chores.

You know that kids are more likely to do their chores, do them better, and do them faster if they get a reward at the end. But how do you figure out what dollar amount to attach to each chore? Everyone has specific situations, but here’s an idea for a place to start.

For some reason, it is easier as adults to figure out how much a person should get paid per hour, and harder to figure out how much you should pay someone to clean out the sink. So, lets figure out how much your child should get paid per hour. Yep an hour. That doesn’t mean they will be working for an hour. But if they were, how much would you pay them for an hours worth of work?

This number is usually most dependant on their age. For example, you may give your 12 year old $6 per hour, and only give $3 per hour to your 6 year old. But other things may come into play here, like how mature they are, or how much you make an hour.

Now, take their hourly wage and divide it by sixty to see how much your child should make per minute. So, If you are paying your 12 year old $6 per hour, that would be 10 cents for each minute of work. This is their minute wage.

Next, we are going to start figuring out how much time it takes to do each chore. Watch your children do their chores for a week or two and keep track of how long it takes to do certain tasks, down to the minute.

Lastly, multiply the number of minutes it takes for them to finish a job, by their minute wage, and you have your job pay rate.

So, if I’m paying my 12 year old $6 per hour, or 10 cents per minute, and it takes him 3 minutes to clean a window, he would get 30 cents to clean the window. Or if it takes him 5 minutes to clean the sliding glass door, that would be worth 50 cents, and so forth.

Be sure to update your “hourly” rate as their ages increase and check in on your job pay rates every now and then to make sure that they are fair. As your children get older they will be able to finish their chores faster so, your time table and job pay rates need to be adjusted accordingly.

MyJobChart.com makes it easy to reward your children for doing their chores. And never fear if you set up a chore with a reward that is way too easy or just the opposite, never going to get done. With just a click of a button, you can change the reward that each job is worth and keep things fair and on track.

Leave a comment and let us know how you decide what to pay for chores.

How do you keep track of chores at your house? Do you have a paper that you have to print out every week with updates and changes? Or maybe it is a big poster on the wall with magnets or clothespins or word strips that get lost under the couch? Maybe it’s one with stickers, and the stickers always get pulled off or you forget to go buy more? Here’s another one, maybe it’s in chalk or dry erase board, and every time you walk by you have to fix the scuff that someone accidently wiped off? How many hours have you spent just making and managing your chore charts?

If you’ve always had a hard time sticking with a system, there is a better solution. Have you ever considered an online chore chart? Think about it. In our fast paced, instant gratification, tech savvy world, how better to get your children to be motivated about doing their chores?

Build and Manage With Ease

No more hours spent finding all of those pictures to put on your chart or using rulers to make the tables just right. No need to change the whole format of your chart just to add another job. MyJobChart.com makes it easy to build and manage your child’s chores online. Sometimes it’s just a matter of communicating exactly what you expect to your children, and we make that easy. With the touch of a button you can add specific and general chores. You can also set up personal hygiene objectives, homework and reading desires, and even behavior goals.

Simple to Keep Track Of

Keep track of completed jobs, points earned, savings, gifts, and rewards. And there’s no need to feel tied to the computer to make it happen. MyJobChart.com can even send you an email or a text when your child’s chores are complete or when they have cashed in their points.

Easy Follow Through

I don’t know how many times our previous systems didn’t work because as the parent, I had a hard time following through with the payment. Either I didn’t have enough time to get the change I needed to pay everyone, or we didn’t keep good enough track of what each child had saved over time. Well, with MyJobChart.com, each child can keep their savings in their own bank account, and when they make purchases online, a text will be sent to you so you know how much money was taken out of your bank account. There couldn’t be anything simpler. No more counting quarters!

If you need a new chore chart, why not give us a try? We’ll take the chore out of your chore charts and get you back in control of your home management.